Snow in Love (9 page)

A

“We should’ve taken my scooter,” he said for the twelfth time.

“Stop. We’re walking. It’s nicer,” I said, but what I meant was that I didn’t want to ride on his scooter for a mile, with him right there in front of me.

Abby was right. Will
did
look good. I’d never really allowed myself to
notice
before because it did no good to think about Will Parker like that. But now, as we walked, my mind kept wandering. A new fantasy had sprung up in fantasyland, and it took place right here in Willow Hill, in school, no less. I was fantasizing about what it would be like to be in class with Will when school started back up again. I wondered if he’d talk to me as much as he seemed to be doing this break. I was very conscious of the fact that he sat right next to me in English, something I’d never thought twice about before.

Also, I was uncomfortable because my heart was beating really loudly. I could hear it in my own ears. I couldn’t even pretend that it was because of the high wire I was going to be walking at the big date, because it started when Will had knocked on my bedroom door a half an hour before we were to meet Jake and Evie. When he saw me, he whistled.

He actually whistled!

Now we were walking down the path and I was spying on him. Like I said, Abby was right. His jeans were new, but they looked broken in. He had on the sneakers that he always wore, which were casual and cool and made him look like he didn’t care too much—this was the look that had slain Sabrina and so many other girls in my school. And his hair wasn’t only washed.

“Did you get a haircut?” I asked, before I could stop the words from flying out of my mouth.

He turned to me as we walked. “Yup. You like?” And he ran a hand through his hair and struck a pouty-lipped pose.

I laughed and kept walking, and tried to breathe deeply to steady my heart rate. It
had
to be nerves. I didn’t like Will Parker. I liked
Jake.
Maybe it was the thing that actors and actresses go through when they are pretending to be married in a movie and fall in love for real, only to break up as soon as the movie is over.

“So, tonight,” I said.

“Yeah. It’s gonna be wild.”

“I think we should set some ground rules.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. Ground rule one. No macking on Jake right in front of me.”

I looked at him, startled.

“What?” he asked. “We’re playing roles, right? No macking on Jake. That’d make you a bad girlfriend.”

“Oh,” I said, and peeked at him. I couldn’t tell if he was giving me a serious message. “Okay, well, no macking on Evie.”

“Why would I do that?” he asked, his voice sounding serious.

“I don’t know. I just thought, you know, I’m matching you, rule for rule.”

He stopped walking. “What’s the point here?”

“Huh?”

“The point. Of tonight?”

“Oh. I don’t know. Evie wanted to do this. I guess just to get through it.”

“Um-hmm.”

“You know, and make Jake realize I’m the better girl for him.”

Will looked away for a minute and raised his shoulders to his chin. I didn’t know what the gesture meant. “Okay. I got it.”

And then he walked forward and I had to catch up. While we walked, I kept trying to picture how I would behave in front of Jake and Evie, but instead all I could think about was the trip to Grizzly Mountain. Again, I pictured the two of us in my father’s plane and got the stomach flips. I shook my head to clear it; I tried to think about Jake.

“You okay?” Will had stopped walking.

“Huh?”

“We’re here.” Will gestured behind him. I had been so wrapped up in my thoughts I hadn’t realized that we were standing on the street opposite of the restaurant. I turned to Will.

“Ready?” I asked.

He reached out to touch my hair. I tried to duck. “What the—?”

He pulled a fuzzy piece of dandelion from my hair and held it up. “Just cleaning you up a bit.”

“Oh. Okay. Sorry. Do I look good now?” I held out my arms and did a mini half-twirl.

His eyes squinted. “Like a million bucks.”

Then he grabbed me by the hand and charged across the street.

His hand was warm, even though it was twenty degrees outside and he hadn’t been wearing gloves on our walk. I felt momentarily embarrassed by the fact that my hands were ice-cold. As we approached the door, I tried to pull my hand from his.

“What’s wrong?” He turned to me, not letting go.

“It’s just…” I pointed to the picture window of the diner. “What if kids from school are in there?”

“So?” He was still holding my hand. And then he shook his head, like he really didn’t care.

I tried to pull it away again, to no avail. “I just—” I held up our clasping hands. “What if someone sees?”

He looked at me like I had twelve heads. “So?” Then he pulled the door open and we walked inside.

The first thing I saw was Sabrina and the Clique of Satan at the choice corner booth, the one with the wraparound bench and the cozy lighting. Her hair was piled on her head like a 1960s movie star and she was wearing a silk print top that seemed like something she borrowed from her mother. Her lips were covered in pink lip gloss. Sitting next to her was Cam, who was idly playing with a spoon. Stephanie and Hannah were there too, bending across the table, hanging on Sabrina’s every word.

She was mid-sentence when she caught sight of Will and me. The French fry she was holding fell to the table.

I couldn’t help it. I smiled. Sabrina’s eyes were wide and her mouth was pursed, and the Clique of Satan looked scared to say
anything
to her. I wanted to jump and shout that
this
was what it felt like to steal other girls’ crushes.

Will saw exactly what I saw and whispered in my ear, “See? Good times.”

“Parker!” Cam shouted, and waved at us.

Will pulled me toward them, still holding my hand. My hand had now warmed up. I was growing very conscious of the fact that it was getting sweaty.

“Parker!” Cam shouted again. This time he backhand-slapped Will. I didn’t know what was up with these boys and last names.

“What’s up, kids?” Will asked the table of people. Sabrina was boring holes into me with her eyes. I tried to position myself behind Will to avoid her death-ray hate stare.

“What are you guys doing?” Sabrina asked finally, seething. Her teeth were clenched so hard I thought they were going to fall out of her head.

“Yeah, you guys want to join up?” Cam pushed farther into the booth, making room for us. “Jessie, is a, um, are your friends coming tonight?”

Will looked at me as I didn’t answer right away, and when I did, my voice sounded like there was a frog in it. “Oh, um, no, we’re, um—” and I looked over my shoulder, trying to see if Evie and Jake were in the diner. They were, in the opposite corner of this cool-kid booth.

“Yeah, we gotta thing we gotta do,” Will announced. He was
still
holding my hand. And Sabrina looked like she wanted to cry. Part of me started to feel bad, but then she clamped down on Cam’s shoulder and glared at me. “We’ll catch you later, Brock.” Then Will and Cam backhand-slapped each other again, and Will finally began walking toward Evie and Jake, pulling me behind him.

“Will!”

“Yeah?” He looked at me over his shoulder.

I opened my mouth to ask him to stop pulling me but couldn’t say anything. His hair was blinding.

“No worries. It’ll be good. C’mon. Let’s sell it.” And then he made a face at me, a face that Jake and Evie wouldn’t have been able to see. He drew his eyes toward his nose and stuck his tongue out. It was so goofy. I couldn’t help myself. I started to laugh.

“There you go. Drive him mad, babe!”

We finally got to the table, and Jake stood up. He was wearing dark blue jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt. His hair was brushed to the side, flopping just over his left eye. I wondered what that meant. He never did his hair like that. Actually,
I
used to style it like that when I was trying to tease him.

“Hey, man,” Will said to him, and held out his hand so he could do that weird-boy slap thing. Jake just looked at Will’s hand, which was suspended in midair.

“Um, hi, guys,” I said.

“Wow! You look great!” Evie said, reaching out to touch my skirt. “Love this fabric!”

“It’s my frie—” Will elbowed me in the side. “Ow!” I said. He made a face at me. I understood what he was trying to say. “It’s my favorite,” I finished up, and took my seat.

“So I ordered appetizers. Does everyone like appetizers?” Evie sat straight-backed, two inches from the support of the booth, passing out menus. She was like a cruise director in training. Perky and pleasant and organizing everything.

“Jake, what’s up, man? How’s the skiing?” Will slung his arm over my shoulder and moved in closer to me. Jake caught my eye and then shifted his gaze to Will’s arm. As if he saw this, Will dropped his hand onto my shoulder and started rubbing it in a circle.

Jake narrowed his eyes, and put
his
arm around Evie. In return I snuggled into Will’s side, which was a bad idea because it sent my stomach onto a roller-coaster track. I tried to disengage but Will wouldn’t let me. His grip on my shoulder was like iron.

I looked at Jake. He looked at me.

Then Evie started up again with her activities directing. “So, I can’t believe how you all know how to ski! I told Jake that I’m no good to him this far north.”

“You don’t ski?” Will asked, looking at me for confirmation.

I nodded. “She likes the spa.”

“The spa? Are you crazy? You’re missing out!”

Evie dipped her lashes and began to blush. I’d seen this look before: It appeared on girls of all ages when they talked to Will. He was like girl catnip.

Will began to describe to her what hitting a perfect powdery hill was like, and her blush deepened. While he talked, he noticeably tapped my shoulder with his fingers. It was like we were communicating without words. He was letting me know that I should talk to Jake while he monopolized Evie’s time.

But Jake wasn’t looking at me. He was studying the menu like it was in Greek. So I kicked him under the table.

“Ouch!” Jake said.

“Are you okay?” Evie asked, tearing her gaze away from Will for two seconds.

“Yeah, yeah, it’s nothing,” Jake replied, and made a face at me, a face that demanded to know why I’d kicked him.

“Sorry,” I mouthed to him, and leaned across the table. “Sorry.”

“What’s going on?” he asked quietly.

“Nothing.” I swallowed hard. It was in this moment that I’d wished I’d formulated a game plan instead of spending so much time falling prey to Will’s mojo. “Just, hey, you want to go skiing with me tomorrow?” I tried to say this softly enough that Evie couldn’t hear, but of course that was stupid. I mean, she was sitting a foot from us!

“Hey!” she interrupted. “I have a great idea! Why don’t the four of us go? And you”—she nodded at Will—“could teach me.”

“I have an even better idea,” Will said.

“You do?” I asked.

“Yeah. They should come to Grizzly Mountain.”

“What? They should?” Now I felt like someone had kicked
me
, but in the stomach and not gently.

“Yeah, they should. Her dad’s a pilot. He’s gonna fly us up to Grizzly Mountain. It’s got the best skiing in the state,” Will explained to Jake and Evie.

Evie’s face lit up. Jake’s fell.

“Jake’s afraid of flying. He won’t go up in my dad’s plane.”

Will shook his head in dismissal. “Nothing to be scared of, dude. We’ll all go.” He smiled at Evie and said, “I’ll be your personal skiing tutor.”

We walked home in silence. I wasn’t purposely trying to not talk, but my mind was such a jumble that I was too busy trying to sort out my thoughts.

Mostly, I felt stupid. There was a small part of me that had started thinking that maybe Will Parker was enjoying fake-dating me.

But after the night at the diner, watching him grin and fawn and chat Evie up, I realized that the whole time he was being so helpful and sweet with me trying to get back at Jake, he was just trying to get to Evie!

And I mean, why wouldn’t he? Evie was gorgeous. She was prettier than Sabrina, and her personality was much easier to take, if you liked the cheery-student-council-president-joins-every-club-there-is type.

The truth was that Will Parker liked every and all types of girls. And every and all types of girls liked him. Of course Evie shouldn’t be any different.

“Hey, why are you so quiet?”

“Huh?” I looked up and noticed that Will was standing three feet behind me. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting for you to notice that I stopped walking.”

“Oh, sorry. I was thinking.”

“Okay.” He moved to catch up to where I was standing. “Tell me.”

“Nothing.”

“Come on. Aren’t you happy? I thought that went really well.”

“But that was only because you kept talking to Evie the whole night!” I spat.

Will stopped walking again. “Wasn’t that the plan?”

I shook my head and crossed my arms. “No.”

“Yes it was,” he said, confused.

“Fine. You’re right.”

“Why are you so cranky? I thought we got what you wanted. Now you’re going to take this awesome trip with Jake, and it was all my doing.” Will smiled at me, like he’d done me this big favor. “You know what? You’re welcome.”

I shook my head again, and said, “That was supposed to be
our
trip.”

He raised an eyebrow, and my face started getting red again. I sounded like a jealous girl. “I thought you would like this better.” From his voice and the way his face looked, I could tell that he was being completely honest.

I immediately felt sorry. I didn’t know why I was behaving like this, like a spoiled brat who wanted all the boys in town just for herself. “I’m sorry, Will,” I said.